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“You’re in Dad’s bed! I knew it would work,” Mickey crowed.
“What would work?” Kon asked from the other side of the bed.
“If Mom stayed here with us, she’d see.”
“See what?” Emma asked her precocious son.
“That me and Dad, we’re both your family. You’re supposed to be together.”
“You think so, huh?” Emma teased, not at all bothered that her son had been matchmaking again.
His distress the day before had been genuine and maybe it had been sparked by fear of her separating herself from Kon, or just plain old insecurity. Emma didn’t care. She loved her son. She loved his father. She wanted a life together as a real family, as Mickey called it, more than just about anything.
“He looks like he wants to kiss you all the time,” Mickey said with a roll of his eyes.
“You’re very insightful, Mishka. How does your mom look at me?” Kon asked in a humor-laden tone.
“Like she wants to trust you. Like after I do something bad and I’m really sorry, but she has to make me go to my room and think about it anyway.”
Their son was insightful. Emma put her arms out and Mickey joined them on the bed without hesitation, snuggling between her and Kon. “From now on, I’m going to look at your dad like I want to kiss him all the time too. What do you think about that?”
“That’s kinda gross, but you’re grown-ups so it’s okay, I guess.”
Kon and Emma shared laughter.
“It is more than okay,” Kon assured him. “It is everything good.”
The rest of that week was filled with family bonding and Emma learning what her life as part of the royal family would be like.
She would have to take classes in etiquette and get coaching on public relations, politics and a bunch of other stuff that frankly didn’t sound very fun.
She would do it though, just like she’d gotten her degree in bookkeeping.
Emma hadn’t particularly enjoyed those courses either, but she’d learned what she needed to be the best mom she could be for Mickey. So she could provide for him.
This was much the same. Only she had both Mickey and Konstantin’s welfare to think about.
Nataliya, who had insisted that Emma drop the honorific unless they were in a formal setting, took a personal role in helping Emma slide into her role as future Princess.
As Kon had told her, it was up to the King whether to confer that title to Emma upon her marriage to his brother and King Nikolai had made it clear he intended to do so.
Mickey had been in alt.
Emma not so much. But, princess or duchess, she had to learn the role and she was committed to doing so.
The royal family planned to introduce her and Mickey to the rest of the world at a banquet for the country’s most elite dignitaries, nobility and business associates. The wedding would take place in only a month’s time.
Emma hadn’t balked at the rapidity of it all, hoping that less time to prepare would equate to a smaller event.
Nataliya, who was fast becoming a very dear friend, had told Emma not to bet on it. Her mom had gotten all the practice she’d needed on Nataliya’s speedy wedding and had stepped in to plan this one with an almost frightening glee.
Emma ached a little, wishing her own mom were there to put her own two cents in, but tried to quash thoughts like that.
Her life was so blessed, Emma didn’t want to dim the joy she could have by grieving what she could not change.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“ARE YOU SURE you shouldn’t have warned Emma about this?” Nikolai asked after Kon told his brother he needed him to cover a meeting so he could go to the airport and greet the arrival of Emma’s estranged parents.
